Jhumpa Lahiri And Edwidge Danticat: A Comparative Analysis

Jhumpa Lahiri and Edwidge Danticat are two authors who help one better understand the theme of self-discovery, through their many stories. In Lahiri’s Interpreter of Maladies, her characters Mrs.Sen and Mr.Pirzada face crises as they struggle to adapt to a new country’s ethical way of life. Meanwhile, Danticat depicts the theme of self-discovery in her book Krik! Krak!, through “A Wall of Fire Rising,” and “Children of The Sea,” where characters face ethical crises in their homeland, Haiti.In both texts, the theme and standard of Interpreter of Maladies, and Krik! Krak!, both show how characters who are forced to move, because of ethical crises are not adapted and self-discover that a better life is hard to achieve, when home is either far
Krak!, characters in Children of The Sea leave their hometowns in Haiti due to force, because of the corrupt and inhumane government, lead by the tonton macoutes, who forcefully make families become intimate with each other, in addition to the other horrid acts such as rape and murder. Celianne is a character who leaves Haiti on a boat in search of a better life and autonomy, because of the constant torture and crises. While she was still in Haiti Celianne was raped by a group of soldiers and to hide the embarrassment she cut her face so nobody would recognize who she was and to console her embarrassment, the text quotes, “The same night, Celianne cut her face with a razor so that no one would know who she was.”(Kompe 56) At that moment her ethical crises was keeping her identity unknown, because she thought that if she did so her life would be better disguised. The razor also symbolizes her realization of something that she thought could aid her crisis and help her achieve a better life. Similarly, on the boat she gives birth to a girl, however unfortunately it is dead after it is born, but Celianne refuses to let it go, as it states in the novel, “Many people have offered to through Celianne’s baby overboard for her. She will not let them.” (Kompe 57) The reason for this is because they had to through many of their possessions overboard to stop the water from leaking into the boat and now they want her to get rid of her last piece of hope
While he is in America he visits an Indian family, where he is treated with uttermost respect from the daughter and main character of the book Lilia. Lilia is a sweet kind girl who enjoys the presence of Mr.Pirzada, because everytime he visits he brings her candy. In addition Lilia feels sorry for Mr.Pirzada, because he misses and worries about his family back in Pakistan during the ethical crises. Lilia quotes, “He took out a plain silver watch without a band, which he kept in his breast pocket,” (Lilia 30) the watch he kept in his breast pocket was set to the local time in Dacca where is family were supposed to be living. The reason of importance for this object is that it symbolizes his home and family, because he keeps it close to his heart and is almost attached to it and takes great care of it too, just like he would take care of his family. In addition, when Mr.Pirzada had stopped visiting her family, before she went to bed she would eat a piece of the candy he gave her and eat it as to pray for him and his family's safety, she quotes, “Since January, each night before bed, I had continued to eat, for the sake of Mr.Pirzada’s family, a piece of candy I had saved from Halloween.” (Lilia 42) The reason this quote is important is because he showed Lilia how